Groundhog Day with no escape

It is the rugby version of Groundhog Day. Each year in the Five Nations (now Six Nations), be it at Lansdowne Road or Murrayfield, Ireland console themselves that there is always someone less fortunate than themselves: unerringly they point the finger at Scotland.

Every year since 1988, bar one, Scotland have prevailed. The only exception was a 6-6 draw in 1994, a strong contender for the worst Test match ever played. The fluctuating fortunes of Ireland and Scotland in any given season don't seem to have a bearing on the outcome of their annual spat.

Scotland continually unhinge Irish expectations, occasionally emphatically and at other times with that heartbreaking facility to edge tight encounters. One would expect that history would counsel Ireland with a sense of foreboding when Scotland loom. The opposite is generally the case.

Perhaps it is because the playing pools in terms of numbers are similar, maybe it is the innate camaraderie felt by two nations with a similar outlook to the amalgam of sport and socialising. For rugby supporters the pilgrimage to Edinburgh is often the most enjoyable weekend away, once the 80 minutes at Murrayfield is erased from the memory.

On Saturday, Ireland will be hoping to break an 11-year sequence, hoping to find an answer to Scotland's high-octane rucking game. But there is nothing to suggest that Ireland will stumble upon El Dorado on Saturday.

Teams representing Ireland beat Scotland at schools and under-21 level with monotonous regularity but once ensconced in the senior arena the same players cannot continue the trend. Scotland teams have an easy identity: powerful rucking, a mobile pack, canny halfbacks and elusive three-quarters seem to permeate all their teams.

Jim Telfer developed a style that maximised the qualities of the Scottish game and allowed the international team to become competitive. Though Ireland can claim to have had better players, the patterns have been more predictable and less adventurous.